beer

This sponsored column is written by Steve Quartell, beermonger at Arrowine (4508 Lee Highway). Sign up for the email newsletter and receive exclusive discounts and offers. Order from Arrowine’s expanding online store for curbside pickup.

Words often fail.

But I’m not here to share my words today. I need to listen.

Listen, and read, and watch, and learn and grow. Because I don’t know about you all but I have always been drawn to beer because it is so absolutely human. It is so bound in community. Bound in what we owe to each other. I grow personally as the scope and diversity of my community grows — I hope you feel the same way.

Growth and change are rooted in better understanding, some of that needs to be rooted in today — we’ll get to that with the black voices below that give me continued insight into experiences outside my own — but so much is rooted in understanding our history.

I’m currently a few chapters into “The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration” by Isabel Wilkerson. But I’m a slow reader, and I absorb information much better through visual instruction, so I am also “binging” a video playlist on Black Voices and Black History put together by the creators of Crash Course.

In our present day — I just came off two years running brewery tours in Washington, D.C. and had the benefit of meeting thousands of people from all over. Fortunately I’ve stayed in touch here and there with both @TheIPAway from the DMV area and @CraftBeerKillah out of Atlanta, Georgia. I love following their takes on their respective beer scenes and consider it a huge part of my understanding of what people love about beer.

I’ve also been inspired by the work of the Black Beer Movement, and am still kicking myself not ever getting my hands on their collaboration beer with Right Proper — a peach fruited Saison called Cuffing Saison.

On a national scale the work done by Beer Kulture, and the book “This Ain’t the Beer You’re Used to” woke me up to the persistent racism that survives in the beer industry at all levels, as well as the different perspectives needed to create change and move forward — it in turn spurred me to find voices I hadn’t heard before like UnCapEverything out of Richmond and TheBrotherAtTheBar out of Chicago.

And I can’t really speak about the brewing industry without mentioning Dr J. Jackson-Beckham of the Richmond Area and Garret Oliver of Brooklyn Brewery, two huge figures who need no introduction I could ever give, but if you aren’t already following them in some capacity — fix that.

Closer to home in our DMV beer industry, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention D.C.’s two black owned breweries Sankofa Beer and Soul Mega — and how much I greatly anticipate when they can begin distribution to Virginia.

At the same time I ran tours, I also worked with one of D.C.’s distilleries One Eight — I had the pleasure of working with and befriending Andrew, @FraudBartender, now the Tasting Room Manager — and worked a tasting table at an event in SE where I had no idea how lucky I was to meet Rabia Kamara owner of Ruby Scoops Ice Cream (Currently trying to finish a store build out in Richmond) and Angela Davis, The Kitchenista — creator of a Mac and Cheese recipe that may change your life.

Just thinking about that Mac and Cheese makes me hungry and also makes me think of the “looks so good it’s unfair I can’t eat it right now” instagram feed of Chef James Turner, Head Chef at Blue 44 in D.C. — you like food? Yeah, I thought so. Me too. Go there, now.

And if all of that makes you thirsty for a beer, call or message your DMV breweries and ask that they participate in the collaboration, “Black” Is Beautiful, raising funds for legal defense reform. I’ll go on record that if my brewery partners brew it, I’ll stack it.

Photo via Instagram

This sponsored column is written by Steve Quartell, beermonger at Arrowine (4508 Lee Highway). Sign up for the email newsletter and receive exclusive discounts and offers. Order from Arrowine’s expanding online store for curbside pickup.

Ever throw a party and wonder if anyone will come? How about throwing an anniversary party and knowing people can’t come?

Richard Hartogs, and the rest of the team at Rocket Frog Brewing Company find themselves celebrating their second year of brewing virtually, hosting a Zoom Happy Hour last night. Rocket Frog came out of the gate strong their first year with a Great American Beer Festival Bronze for their Wallops Island Brown Ale.

For many new breweries, that first year can all blur together. In their sophomore season, there are at least reference points to look back on. Per Richard, “it felt like we were finally in a good groove — probably our best as a working production brewery–in February.” And then all those lessons learned had to be shelved for one guiding idea: adapt.

Rocket Frog closed their taproom ahead of Gov. Northam’s executive order and were early adopters of “Biermi,” a beer pick-up and delivery app developed by DMV-area brewery, True Respite. I can say from personal experience their pick-up operation is one of the smoothest and safest of any brewery I have ordered beer from in the last two months. Hand sanitizer is available for guests, staff members are in gloves and masks, and orders can be picked up from tables or brought outside for contactless curbside pick-up with a quick phone call.

Closing the taproom may have been a quick decision, but it certainly wasn’t easy. “We had to lay off some brewery staff. That was hard on Russell (Carpenter, PhD, Head Brewer), but we’ve recently brought them back in for some hours and hope to have him back soon.”

Next challenge: anniversary plans. Richard is no stranger to virtual or in-person beer meetups, having run Beer Head on meetup.com and being a regular contributor to the YouTube beer show Better Beer Authority. Last night, co-hosting with CJ Cross of Hops N Shine in Del Ray, Rocket Frog had their anniversary via Zoom.

Was it as good as an in person event? No. Adaptation is like that. We do what we can while we can. Maybe we find ways, bit by bit, to improve, to move from surviving to thriving. Right now at Arrowine we seem to adapt to something new each day. Until we can see you all again, we’ll be here operating as safely as possible, providing you the assortment of beers, wines, cheeses, and more that help bring some comfort into your home.

Photo via Facebook

This sponsored column is written by Nick Anderson, beermonger at Arrowine (4508 Lee Highway). Sign up for Nick’s email newsletter and receive exclusive discounts and offers. Order from Arrowine’s expanding online store for curbside pickup.

We’re starting off this week with recommended reading: Mike Snider at USA Today picked up on that Brewer’s Association survey I mentioned in my last column and ran with it, talking to several breweries about their experience during the pandemic, and how long they think they can sustain themselves.

Like in the survey, the responses are not encouraging but they’re not hopeless either. You can check out the piece here.

Prominently quoted in Snider’s article is Greg Engert of Neighborhood Restaurant Group. Besides local beer scene landmarks like Church Key and the two Rustico locations, NRG also has their Bluejacket Brewery in D.C. Bluejacket’s beers had, over the past year, gone from mostly D.C. with some appearances at Virginia bars and restaurants to becoming available at retailers with draft stations like Arrowine.

Now, Bluejacket is one of a sudden multitude of breweries whose beers will show up right at your door through NRG’s Neighborhood Provisions ordering service (Note: my wife and I placed a Neighborhood Provisions order within the past week; it’s outstanding).

With restaurants being decimated, breweries that were previously focused on “on-premise” sales have shifted, making beers available to consumers that we never would’ve expected to be retailed — and with home delivery, at that. Aslin, Bluejacket, Ocelot, Wheatland Spring and more NoVA breweries are now dropping beers at your doorstep — check with each for minimums, etc.

Outside of the immediate area, Richmond heavy hitters The Veil and Triple Crossing are now offering delivery of their beers to homes in NoVA, making many beer geeks daydreams come true.

It’s odd to encourage people to buy their beer directly from the brewery rather than from Arrowine, but the vast majority of these breweries weren’t distributing to retail anyway and weren’t planning to: the exceptions being the occasional Bluejacket keg (as of this writing, I have two on our draft station) and Aslin can release (again, two new ones just hit our Online Store.)

Also, this whole thing is going to come to an end someday and while I know we’ll lose some — maybe a lot — of our great local breweries, I want as many as possible to survive. Not to mention that right now, when we can’t go out and get together like we want to, it’s nice to have something exciting and enjoyable available. Anyway, we’re not hurting for selection at Arrowine.

So, going forward what I think I’d like to do is, as often as possible, use this column to feature different breweries to shine a light on them, and what they’re going through during this… let’s say unique?… period in time. Drop into the comments if you’ve taken advantage of any of these direct delivery options, whose beers you’ve ordered, and how the experience as been.

Take care of each other. See you next time.

This sponsored column is written by Nick Anderson, beermonger at Arrowine (4508 Lee Highway). Sign up for Nick’s email newsletter and also receive exclusive discounts and offers.

Readers of this column caught a hint about Port City’s new Beach Drive Golden Ale last fall, when brewery Founder Bill Butcher mentioned during a chat that “a new Session Ale will arrive for the spring”.

Little did we know then what this spring would be like. With a Brewer’s Association survey released this week showing nearly half of responding breweries saying they would only be able to survive between one to three months under current conditions, what’s it like to roll out a new addition to your core lineup?

I reached out to Port City Director of Sales John Gartner to find out, and to get some details on the beer itself.

Beach Drive has been in the works since July of last year. The concept was “to capture the freedom and beauty of Beach Drive in Rock Creek Park — easy going and refreshing.” Head Brewer Jonathan Reeves aimed to create a low-alcohol beer inspired by the low-gravity desítky style of Czech Lager, with the twist of using Port City’s go-to Ale yeast and a new American-grown experimental hop variety with spicy, floral characteristics reminiscent of classic European Noble hops.

Gartner says with Beach Drive, Reeves “was looking for the dryness of our Oktoberfest and the bitterness of our Helles”, and the finished product nails that perfectly. What surprised me was how full-bodied Beach Drive feels for a beer that clocks in at 4% ABV.

The combination of Pilsner, Vienna, and Munich malts with that yeast strain works a minor miracle toward that end, and the experimental hop comes through with just the right amount of bitterness and spice.

Beach Drive also looks great, with a very nice wrap around its 12oz cans — another new thing for Port City. In the fall, Bill Butcher was talking about continuing to use mobile canning as Port City introduced its first 12oz canned beer, but the brewery ended up finding a used canning line to install in its Alexandria brewery.

The sporadic nature of mobile canning created constraints in the brewery’s cellar, according to Gartner. Buying the canning line allows Port City to produce the amount of packaging it needs as it needs and gives it flexibility in packaging future beers (no spoilers, but: look for some new 16oz can offerings from Port City this year; new 12oz cans are likely to appear, but none are planned for the rest of 2020 right now).

I’ll let John close the column out this week with some words on the experience of introducing Beach Drive now, how Port City is weathering the pandemic,and what you can do to support your local brewery.

“Launching this brand in our current environment has not been easy… the health and safety of all of our co-workers and customers is the most important thing — so there has been a lot of changes around the brewery to be proactive about internal and external safety, which has caused things to slow down.

“Overall, our staff, distributor partners and customers (like Arrowine) have been extremely helpful… during these times, we are proud to be able to launch new brands, and hopefully create a little joy in the world.

“(L)isten and follow the guidelines of the CBC — and support your local businesses. And not to be greedy, but when you do support your local businesses and you see a Port City product — maybe be so kind and include it with your purchase!”

Until next time.

This sponsored column is written by Nick Anderson, beermonger at Arrowine (4508 Lee Highway). Sign up for Nick’s email newsletter and also receive exclusive discounts and offers.

This was supposed to be a column about beer this week.

Well, it’s always supposed to be about beer but this one was supposed to be about the Lager I just got at Arrowine from Únětický Pivovar in Únětice, Czech Republic.

The beer is stunning: a double-decoction mashed, open fermented, honey golden dream of a Lager featuring malts from the 500-year old Malthouse Kounice and hops from the Žatec region. My friends at B. United sent a pressure — and temperature-controlled tank over, brought it back, and kegged off of it quickly enough to get this unfiltered, unpasteurized gem to a few accounts all over the country — and Arrowine was fortunate enough to be one.

Not only that, but of 3,500L brought to the States, we got 60L worth in the form of a pair of 30L kegs.

Make no mistake, I’m enjoying the hell out of the beer. So are many of our clients at Arrowine (I don’t expect it to last much longer past the time this column is published). It just feels… wrong to focus on it, and it alone?

So: How are you?

We’re holding up okay. Every day is an adventure right now: new guidelines, new closings, new SOP, but we’re here. We’re making it work however we can. Every day we’re getting a little more dialed-in on how the shop’s going to run to get us to the other side of this. I’ve been bowled over by our clients.

I assume a couple of you are on here reading right now, so thank you thank you thank you for your support. Not only in terms of the business itself, but for how many of you have reached out just to ask how we’re doing. I’m not sure I can truly explain what that means to us.

Perhaps I don’t have to. We all have friends in the hospitality industry and have had to watch it be just wiped out by this seemingly overnight. There are so many bars, restaurants, and yes, breweries that are just hanging on for dear life right now and those are the ones that haven’t already folded.

There are dozens of people I know who are suddenly out of work, and many who are putting in Herculean efforts to keep their ship afloat. Over the coming — who knows, weeks, months? — I’m hoping to be able to bring you some of their stories, and let you know how you can support them.

For now, stay safe, and enjoy what you can when you can.

This sponsored column is written by Nick Anderson, beermonger at Arrowine (4508 Lee Highway). Sign up for Nick’s email newsletter and also receive exclusive discounts and offers.

D.C.’s ANXO Cider is a favorite here at Arrowine and, as you might infer, of mine as well.

ANXO’s style is built around zero-adjunct, wine or native yeast fermented, completely dry ciders. The results have been a showcase for the apples used: mostly sourced from here in Virginia along with some from Pennsylvania, but in some cases including varieties from Oregon and Washington — including a very cool red-fleshed apple from Washington used to make their Rosé with no hibiscus or other coloring adjunct.

Among the best-received special releases from ANXO last year was a cider then called Intercontinental, recently re-released under its new name, Hereford Gold.

To make Hereford Gold, ANXO partnered up with Oliver’s Cider and Perry of Ocle Pychard in Herefordshire, England. The process involves Oliver’s sending some of their native yeast-fermented, wood-aged cider to D.C., where ANXO blends it with stainless steel-fermented, Pennsylvania-grown Goldrush apple cider.

The result is a truly complimentary blend of ingredients and styles. The classically earthy, slightly funky English cider of Oliver’s is balanced by the fruitier but no less dry American cider. The ciders have a harmonious acidity level, and while Hereford Gold is still pretty tannic by American standards, it is nonetheless tempered a bit by the Goldrush.

You can find cans of Hereford Gold around NoVA right now, but there was one sixtel (small keg, 5.17 gallons) that came through — and by now I think you know who has that. It just so happens that our friends from ANXO will be joining us here at Arrowine this very evening, February 28, from 5-7 p.m. for a sampling of Hereford Gold as well as some of their year-round offerings. It’s my first cider keg, so I’m pretty excited.

I hope to see you there, and if I don’t come find me around the shop and I’ll be happy to guide you through our ANXO stock anytime.

Upcoming Arrowine Events:

Friday, February 28, 5-7 p.m.: ANXO Cider tasting — only keg of Hereford Gold in NoVA on tap for fills
Sunday, March 1, 1-4 p.m.: German Wine Tasting — eight tables of German wines with winemakers and owners present
Monday, March 2, 5-7 p.m.: AR Lenoble Champagne tasting with Director of Export Christian Holthausen
Wednesday, March 4, 4:30-7:30 p.m.: Old Ox Brewing tasting with Sean Tracy — seasonal releases open and feature pricing on Black Ox fills
Saturday, March 14, 1-4 p.m.: Virginia wine tasting featuring Governor’s Cup Award winners
Tuesday, March 24, 6:30-9:30 p.m.: Spanish wine dinner at SER with winemaker Issac Fernandez and importer Aurelio Cabestrero of Grapes of Spain